Page 36 of A Dance With Devils
“Here.”
My frame spins, hands scratching the ground to get me facing him. He looms over me, a smile on his face about something, blood running from his head, and no shirt. My mouth opens, heat reverberating through me because of the visual. So tall. Big. Muscles. Dark eyes.
My eyes. I remember that.
My fingers touch my cheek, run to my lips, gently tracing lines I can still feel him on. Taste him on. He was there, on me. In me. My body writhes at the memory of it, almost melts under his gaze. So hot again. Humid and cloying. And that lightning – so, so appealing. So full and light and bright in my dark tunnel. I could melt here with him, lose consciousness and dwell in the glows and streaks. That’s what I want – to lose myself. Be lost in the wilderness – free to run and fly and find my way with him. I can’t, though … Run. I need to run and fly away.
From him.
“Pretty little Alice. Are you ready to fall?”
Fall where? I can’t fly yet. No falling for me.
Not ready.
Scuttling backwards, I close my mouth and push myself into a corner again. I need the birds for falling. They’ll help me – show me how to ascend. Up. I have to go up. All the way up to the snow and the cold and the wind.
“Up,” mumbles out of me. “Up. I need up and my birds before that.” He frowns and walks, purposeful strides coming closer and closer as if my words mean nothing to him. “You don’t understand. I need them.” My back climbs the wall, feet pushing me upright until I’m somewhere near his eye-line. “I need them so I can be free. Not hunted. In the dark –with you. I need my birds for flying.” The boots stop, his head tilting, and my fingers gingerly reach for his face. “I can fall then. It’ll be alright to fall. Come with me. We’ll be safe.”
Such dark eyes. All mine if I want them. I know that. Can feel it inside me, just like I can feel his weight getting closer and closer. Blood slips over my fingers from the cut on his forehead. It sits on the pads, gently tricking into the grooves and ridges on my hands. My blood – his.
Ours.
My hand pulls back, eyes tracing lines on his chest that I want to touch. “I’ll fall and not worry anymore, Malachi. Help me find my birds.”
No response. Just his face and his chest and his size making me feel so small, so insignificant. I’m not, though. I’m me. Alice Maria Contreas. I think I’m me anyway. I knock my head, shoulders brushing the wall, as the lightning keeps glancing off his body. Alice can’t fall until she’s secure, until her brothers are. We’ll be free then. Nothing to worry about. “They’re up, Malachi. Up high. You know they are.” He does. I can tell. He knows me – is inside of me with me. He should feel it, understand.
Still nothing.
I back along the wall, shuffling my body until I’m under the frame and out into one of the halls. It isn’t until I get there and stumble across a large, ornate mirror that I remember I’m in underwear that isn’t mine, the dress discarded. I falter at the sight of myself, eyes taking in the fine, blue lingerie and my mass of dishevelled curls skimming my breasts. That isn’t me. It doesn’t look like me anyway. Maybe it is here, though. Maybe I’m different now – like the birds that keep calling for me and the wolves that keep chasing.
My fingers rake over the glass, tracing lines reflecting back at me with the blood on my fingers. All my tattoos are there, all the flowers and the colours under blue scrapes of material. It is me – must be. And wings. I’ve got wings coming from my eyes, black streaks of them cutting a line of dark shadows. A laugh giggles out, fingers sharpening the wing to a point with red blood and then smoothing my hair into shape. A hawk – that’s what I am. A hawk that will hunt rather than flee.
A sexy hawk at that.
I pitch, turn, look at my ass and my legs and then tilt my chin.
Better. Stronger.
“Come with me,” his voice says. I glance right to see him moving, his boots almost spinning up the wall as he goes down our tunnel. Maybe he can fly to? We’ll both fly. Fly out of this tunnel and soar across the world.
“Why?”
“Sssh. Trust me.”
He waits and beckons his fingers back at me, wiggling them as if I should hurry and catch him – hold his hand. That was nice. I remember it, remember chasing after him as he pulled me along to the outside world. I need that like I need my birds, need that feeling, as if the two are mutually joined somehow, but trust? He was hunting me, making me run like I have done for years.
Lightning flashes slowly as I get to him, the tunnel brightening and bouncing around me, as we both spin without moving. “Freak,” muses out of me.
He chuckles and squeezes his hand around mine, dragging me closer until I’m under his arm and we’re walking as one. “We all are,” he says, lowly. “Reality out there isn’t what we’re supposed to be. It’s real here.” He stops and pulls me to his lips again. “Can you feel that? Hear it? Lovely.”
My body sways under his, arms being moved into some dance hold I’ve never even tried.
“I don’t d-“
“Move with me,” he murmurs. “Give me this. Don’t think. You’re safe for now.”
And then we’re dancing. We’re dancing through corridors that keep turning and twisting around us continuously. I close my eyes to the walls undulating and pulsing, just giving in to the feel of him controlling me like a puppet. Left, right. Spin and turn. It goes on and on, my body folding and changing wherever he takes me. Everything clears, goes darker and deeper than it was before. I’m whirling, my hair swishing out as his skin holds me firmly against him. Lips touch my neck, nibbling gently across my throat and chest, as I’m leaned back through another whirl.
